karma is a cat
JASON walked over to where Piper and her friend, presumably Leo, were sitting. It had been a week since Piper had invited and in their last defence against the dark arts class on Monday she told him to meet them at the pine tree on the west side of the lake.
They were on the east side.
“Hi,” Jason waved to the two.
The short, latino boy who had elvish ears perked up, “Hey, hey! I’m Leo Mcshizzle, what’s your name, hot stuff?”
What kind of name was that? And why did Leo call me ‘hot stuff’?
Jason blushed a bit.
Piper swatted Leo, “oh Leo! You know his name!”
“Annoying? Am I right-“ Leo went to wink at Jason but then got smacked by Piper, “god Piper! Will you stop that!”
“His name is Leonidas Hugo Valdez by the way,” Piper winked, Jason could see her eyes changing from a brown to a nice dark green.*
Leo looked at Piper betrayed, he put a hand to his heart, “Piper! You promised!”
Piper smirked, “didn’t make me do a pinky promise.”
Leo grumbled, “so hot stuff,” Leo flicked his hand through his luscious brunette locks, his face morphed into a mischievous expression, “what are you into,” he sent a wink to Jason’s direction.
“Oh my god Leo,” Piper face palmed herself, “Stop hitting on every person we see!”
“But I can’t help it! It’s like a.. sixth sense!” Leo complained.
Piper rolled her eyes and smiled at Jason while bringing her hand up to her head and lifting her index finger and swirling it around.
Jason was confused on what exactly she was doing but laughed anyway to blend in as she was laughing too.
“Hey! Piper!” Leo pouted.
Piper just laughed at what Leo was doing
What is this? Jason thought, do friends normally hit and make fun of each other? That does not sound like a good friendship? It sounds rather toxic.**
Piper perked up as she remembered something, “oh yeah! Are you guys going to join that new duelling club they set up? I heard there was one during Professor Potter’s second year but that one had that old Lockheart guy. Yeah the faker one, the one who like faked doing all those cool things I think? Some of my dorm mates grandmother’s and their mother’s were obsessed with him. He’s pretty good lucking too, what a shame. I mean I don’t swing that way- anyway back on track, this time they’re having a competent leader, I think it’s going to be Professor Potter?”
This Piper girl surely talks a lot.
“Okay Pipes, slow down-“
Piper slapped Leo, “don’t tell me to slow down! You talk way faster!”
“-As I was saying,” Leo shot a look at Piper in a…playful but threatening way? This people are weird, “yeah I’ll probably join, it’d be cool right? Like, learning really cool magic that we probably wouldn’t learn until like… fifth year normally! Like, um, Potter, Yeah Potter! Harry Potter, you know he was actually going to be an Auror until he decided to become a teacher here instead? Yeah cool right! Professor Potter was going to be a wizard cop-!”
“And here you’re telling me I talk fast?” Piper rolled her eyes.
Leo started at Piper, “back to what I was saying! Professor Harry Potter’s signature move was expelliarmus, which he learned in the duelling club back in his second year! Maybe we’ll learn that!” Leo’s eyes filled with glee.
“You mean that Lockheart guy? He thought Professor Potter that spell? Piper, I thought you said he was incompetent?” Jason asked, directing the last question to Piper.
Piper put her hand up defensively, “hey! I did not say that!”
“You implied it,” Jason told her, was this Piper seriously that dumb?
“When?” Piper smirked, thinking she had won.
“You said, and I quote, ‘this time they’re having a competent teacher”. That’s implying Professor Lockheart wasn’t competent, is it not?”
“Oh,” Piper groaned.
“Sorry about her, she hates being wrong- ouch! Piper- OW- stop!” Leo was currently being hit by Piper.
The bell inside of Hogwarts was heard, “hm, Jason what class do you have next?” Piper asked him.
Jason looked at his magic schedule,
Wednesday
6.00am — 7.30am : Breakfast.
8.00am — 9.00am : Charms with Hufflepuff.
9.00am — 10.00am : Free Period.
10.00am — 11.00am : Potions with Ravenclaw.
“Found it! Oh I have potions with Ravenclaw!” Jason exclaimed a bit too loud.
Leo pointed at Jason, “hah! You're with me hot stuff!” Leo sent a wink over to Jason’s way.
“Good luck!” Piper shouted when she ran off giggling.
“So, hot stuff, what kind of stuff do you like? I need a better nickname than hot stuff, you know?” Leo leaned over beside Jason.
Jason did not know.
“Oh, well I’m guess I’m… hm…” Jason didn’t know what he was into, or what he liked. There was nothing like that in camp Jupiter. And it’s not like he can tell this mortal that he has played war games for fun since he was three.
Cecelia gasped, “Praetor Michaels! You can’t seriously think that this boy, this child- this toddler! You can't think he, a toddler, would be able to compete in war games? He’s three years old for the love of the gods!”
“He needs to prepare for his future. He is a child of our Lord Jupiter!” Praetor Michaels shouted.
“Our Lord Jupiter can shove himself right up my ass!” Cecelia shouted back, “He is practically a baby!”
Praetor Michaels pointed to the door, “get out!”
Cecelia ran towards the door, her eyes welled up with tears, “Fine! Just remember, look at you! You’re making a child, a baby at that, fight in war games! He’s-“
“Go!” Praetor Michaels shouted in anger, “be grateful I’m letting you stay, although you should be punished greatly for bad mouthing our Lord Jupiter!”
“Fuck you! I’m leaving!” Cecelia screamed.
“Cecelia,” Praetor Michaels said calmly, “don’t you fucking dare. You’ll die.”
“I thought you were already going to kick me out, father,” Cecelia spat out the word like it was vermin.
“Cecelia darling, plea-“
“Don’t you fucking ‘Cecelia darling’ me!” She shouted in his face.
“Cecelia Eliah Michaels!” Her father screamed.
“Goodbye you two faced bastard,” Cecelia spat out, angrily stormed out of the building, “don’t act like you care about me, we both know you stopped caring once my mother died!”
“Cecelia, the stress of being praetor-“
“Fuck off! Fuck you!” Cecelia ran towards the fifth cohort.
Praetor Michaels ran after Cecelia, realising what she was going to do, “Cecelia! Don’t even fucking think about taking him- Our Lord Jupiter will-“
Cecelia scoffed, “punish me? Our Lord Jupiter has never cared what happened to their children, the demigods, neither has our Lord Mercury, our Lady Venus, the only slightly ‘ok’ godly parent would be our Lord Mars! And father,” again she spat the word out like it was vermin, “you are no better than them, you are just a selfish, pathetic, greedy-“
“ENOUGH,” hecommanded.
That was the last time anyone ever saw Cecelia. Even in Jason’s fuzzy memories he still remembered her fair blonde hair and dark blue eyes. She was a legacy of Mercury and Fortuna. Mercury being her father’s, former Praetor John Michaels, father and Fortuna being her mother’s, who no one except Praetor Michaels and well, Cecelia knew the name of, mother.
“-ason, earth to Jason? Jason!” Leo was waving his hand in Jason’s face.
Jason snapped back to reality.
“Oh sorry!” Jason stammered out, “let’s go now!”
“Pssh, nah,” Leo flicked his hand.
“What do you mean ‘nah’?” Jason narrowed his eyes at the strange specimen that was Leonidas Hugo Valdez.
“What’s the harm in ditching? It’s not like we’re gonna make it in time?” Leo shrugged.
Jason spoke, “oh, I guess we can ditch it if there is no harm?”
Leo pointed at him, “that’s the spirit!”
Jason looked around him, no spirits? What is Leo talking about?***
“Anyway, let’s go somewhere!” Leo exclaimed, “Oo! I have a brilliant idea on where we should go!”
Even though Jason had only known Leo for the past hour and a bit, Jason knew what that tiny glint in Leo’s eyes meant, absolute chaos. Jason wondered if Leo had been blessed by Chaos themself.
“We should go to, drum roll please,” Leo lifted his arms up, frowned when Jason didn’t do a drum roll and then just did the drum roll himself, “…Professor McGonagall’s office!”
“No,” Jason said.
Leo got down on his knees, “please…” he looked at him with a face similar to a wolf pup when it was sad with their mother.
Jason had learned from the other pups how to do that. Did Leo learn that from a wolf pup too? No, Jason had never seen Leo around Camp Jupiter before, so he couldn’t have been a legacy or a demigod.****
Jason sighed, “fine, but only because you are good at the sad wolf pup face!”
“The sad wolf pup face- I thought it was called sad puppy dog face? Eh never mind, let’s go!” Leo skipped off towards Hogwarts.
Oh, perhaps Leo had learned from a young dog pup? That would explain it.
Jason sighed yet again, he had a feeling he would be doing that a lot in this relationship between him and Leo, and also Piper of course. Jason quickly ran after Leo.
Leo whispered something to Jason, “okay, we got to stay enough at of the way of the portraits as we can, ‘kay?”
Jason nodded.
“So, the safe ones are; Lord Gareth, like the one with the eleventh century night in it, and the only other safe one is a painting of Fred Weasley, he was a prankster here in the 90s! So he’s gonna protect the fellow troublemakers. Make sure not to go near Peeves, he’s a poltergeist, he’ll tease you and go get Filch. You do not want to meet Filch.”
Leo led Jason through a safe way to the Headmistress’s office.
“Okay, since Professor McGonagall has an unhealthy obsession with cats, well her animagus is one but anywho, or is it anyways? Eh not important, well anyways, her password is probably a cat breed? So, uhh, do you know any?”
“British Shorthair?” He guessed. No.
“Rag doll?” No.
“There is one called a rag doll? What kind of name is that?” Leo asked.
Jason shrugged, “Burmese cat?” No
“Scottish fold?” Yes!
“Ah, I should have known she would go for a Scottish cat because well, you know, she is Scottish!” Leo said
The gargoyle turned around and revealed a spiral staircase.
They climbed the staircase and opened a large door leading to the circular shaped office.
Portraits of the previous headmasters and headmistresses of Hogwarts stood before them.
Jason caught sight of two portraits next to each other, Severus Snape and Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, their engravings had read.
“Oh, Severus look! It seems two children have entered the headmistress’s office!” Albus Percival Wulfric Brian- that name was a bit too long, Jason will just refer to him as Dumbledore.
“Albus… oh,” Severus Snape said in a cold tone, “what are you two doing here?”
“We need to see Professor McGonagall?” Leo said in a questioning tone.
Dumbledore sighed, “ah, what do you need from Minerva?” Yeah, Dumbledore knew Leo was lying through his teeth.
“Uh- hey why does your name have ‘dumb’ in it? Is it because you are dumb?” Leo asked to change the current topic.
Severus Snape scoffed, “how dare you speak to Dumbledore-!”
“Shush Severus, it is fine. So boys, what brings you here?” He addressed the last part of the conversation to the boys.
“Uh, we kinda just didn’t want to be late for class because we were already pretty late so we just came up here to explore.”
Dumbledore took in Leo’s explanation, “I see, and what are your names?”
Leo spoke up first, “Bad boy supreme, Leo McShizzle, at your service-“
“Sorry about him, I’m Jason Grace, he is Leo Valdez,” Jason interrupted, he was told not to interrupt people but he felt like he had to do it to Leo here.
“Ah, nice to meet you Mr. Grace. And nice to meet you as well Mr. Valdez.”
Professor McGonagall walked through the door at that moment, along with Professor Weasley and Professor Potter.
“Hello Mr. Grace and Mr. Valdez,” Professor McGonagall said in a polite threatening manner, “please take a seat,” she gestured towards four chairs, two beside the main headmistress’s chair and two across from it in front of the desk.
Jason and Leo both gulped but sat on the two seats in front of the desk. Professor Weasley and Professor Potter sat on the other two seats beside Professor McGonagall.
“Care to explain why you two were in my office, while you two were supposed to be in Professor Weasley’s Charms lesson?” Professor McGonagall raised an eyebrow.
“Sorry Professor McGonagall, sorry Ma'am, it won’t happen again-“ Jason said.
“Uh, we’re uh- really sorry Professor-“ Leo said at the exact same time.
“If you are so sure it won’t happen again,” Leo’s face lit up with hope, “then I will only give you two weeks detention with Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley respectively,” Leo deflated but perked up again when he heard Weasley.
“And who’s getting who?” asked Leo with his usual mischievous tone.
“Mr. Grace will be assigned to Mr. Potter, and you, Mr. Valdez, will be assigned to Mr. Weasley,” Professor McGonagall said.
Leo’s face lit up and he smirked at Professor Weasley. Professor Weasley noticed the prankster and troublemaker smirk and smirked back, adding a wink as well.*****
Professor McGonagall smiled reminiscing something from the past, “I feel like I am going to regret that decision Mr. Valdez.”
Leo winked at her, “yep! You are!”
“Alright! Off you go you two! I do not want to catch you in my office, or anybody’s office, again! Understood?” Professor McGonagall called out.
“Yes Ma’am!” Jason and Leo both said together, though Leo added a tiny salute of sorts.
Professor McGonagall chuckled, “now go before I make it three weeks.”
Jason and Leo ran off back down the spiral staircase.